


here and there and what to do about it

by sweetsunlights



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/F, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, M/M, Not Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Compliant, POV Alternating, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Slow Burn, Walks In The Woods, canon can suck my dick, gonna make these bitches happy for once but it may take some time, idk what the fuck i'm doing please bear with me
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-21
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:47:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24306916
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sweetsunlights/pseuds/sweetsunlights
Summary: When the Triskelion sank to the bottom of the Potomac and dragged her career down with it, Sharon Carter had no choice but to take a step back from it all. Going back to her home in Maryland to pick up the pieces felt like the best decision to make. What she wasn't expecting was Steve Fucking Rogers showing up at her door, holding a file and asking for her help.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers, Sharon Carter/Natasha Romanov
Comments: 13
Kudos: 18





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [fight like girls for our place at the table](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16612391) by [napricot](https://archiveofourown.org/users/napricot/pseuds/napricot). 



> hi :) this is my first time writing a fic and mind you it ain't that fucking good but i need practice writing so here we fucking are. that being said ! i mainly wrote this because i wanted to write about one of the cap fam being from maryland, so i figured i might as well make it sharon so that i could write some natsharon. so far no archive warnings apply but if that changes i'll be sure to let y'all know. i hope y'all enjoy it, and please please PLEASE give me any feedback (don't be shy please i'll gladly take any and all feedback and i won't take it personally) :)
> 
> title is from a richard siken poem.

Placing the last of her cardboard boxes into her trunk, Sharon Carter slammed it shut and looked up from her license plate where her eyes had lingered, only to stare blankly at the cars lined up along the sides of the street. She stood there, head slightly tilted and hands on her hips, grounding her as she silently overlooked the way too quiet DC street. Friday mornings usually lacked the traffic that plagued the rest of the work week.

_Am I actually going to miss waking up to honking cars everyday?_ she asked herself. Lightly sighing, she turned and went back into the apartment building, and began bouncing up the steps with unneeded urgency, not stopping till she reached her floor; a habit from her childhood she never bothered to outgrow.

Her footsteps echoed throughout the empty staircases, the walls and railings reminding her of the museum exhibits showcasing the inside of a whale’s mouth. Upon reaching her floor, she slowly made her way to the end of the hall. She passed by the door to Steve’s apartment, unable to bring herself to look at it. It was a painful reminder of Fury’s death and the horrible events that followed. The gunshots she had heard normally wouldn’t have alarmed her too greatly, but that night they had seemed to ring louder than expected. Every night since then she had found herself wide awake and unable to sleep, the sound of gunshots echoing in her head, reminding her of how she had failed. _What else could I have done?_ She had tried telling herself. It was no use. She felt guilty about it anyway.

Her door was scratched and there were still remnants of yellow caution tape along the frame, the aftermath of the raid on her apartment that had occurred just a week prior. When word of the Shield infiltration got out, every three letter acronym organization in the country (and outside of it) immediately launched an investigation on almost every Shield employee. Clearly, they were worried that Sharon Carter, great-niece of Margaret “Peggy” Carter, the fucking founder of Shield, was at risk of being a Hydra agent.The thought of possibly betraying Peggy hurt her deeply, but she wouldn’t have had it any other way. She no longer knew who to trust, and the investigations did little to soothe her. Just a few days prior, she had stopped asking for updates about the investigations all together. Every time she learned about a new mole, a piece of her resolve seemed to break. 

What had hurt her the most was the sheer amount of them. These were people that she had known and interacted with daily. She had sat with them at lunch, looked at their vacation pictures, and giggled with them during meetings. And yet so many of them were actively screwing over the people that they were sworn to protect. And she had known them. Caroline from logistics. Robert from communications. Sofia, who she had gone on two dates with. Even the fucking intern in accounting was Hydra. They were all members of Hydra the entire time, and no one had noticed a thing. The thought both infuriated and pained her.

Trying to shake these thoughts away, Sharon turned her attention back to her battered door. Shield had owned the apartment and had stationed her there during her time surveilling Steve, but he was off on his own and there was no Shield to report back to, so Sharon made what she thought was the most logical choice. She was going to go home. Unlocking the door and walking in, she stopped and peered at the vacant house, not even bothering to close the door. It showed no sign of being lived in other than the travel mug that sat on the kitchen counter, empty with the exception of a ring of condensation around it to keep it company.

She had lived here for only a few months, but she found that her stomach was tying itself into knots as she went to place the keys down next to her coffee. It wasn’t that she felt attached to the apartment, but she felt that by leaving it she was leaving a part of her life, one that she had built around Shield. This was something that had been ingrained so deeply into her life from a young age, and leaving the apartment felt like an extension of Shield. She felt that by turning her back on it, she was giving up a part of herself. Maybe she was; but then again, who was to say? Sharon Carter had given her all to an organization that had been a part of her life since she was a kid, and now all that remained of it was a pile of rubble at the bottom of the Potomac. 

Picking up the travel mug, she walked back to the entrance and shut the door behind her. Trudging past the hallway and down the stairs, she walked out of her apartment building for the last time without sparing it another glance. Turning the keys to the ignition, she slowly pulled out of her parking space and steered her car down the street. _So much for keeping your head down during surveillance, Carter,_ she mused as a final goodbye to that chapter of her life. Piloting through the District, she weaved her way past early morning commuters, before eventually driving by alongside the C&O Canal. 

The once barren trees hung over the river with little green leaves adorning them, with more and more showing up every day. Sharon gazed at them from her car, a faint smile slowly starting to spread as warm sunlight seeped in through her car window as she rode through the Clara Barton Parkway. She had loved going on runs by the trail whenever she had the chance, the sound of birds reminding her of all the weekends she had spent there biking as a kid. _Maybe I should take up biking again,_ she pondered as she crossed the state line. There, written in white against the brown background stood a sign that she had not seen in a while, despite it’s close proximity to her old apartment. A simple sign really, one that is easily overlooked by most; but for Sharon it was a sign of comfort.

MARYLAND  
STATE LINE

Sharon Carter’s life may have gone to shit in a week, but maybe there was still some hope of getting it back on track to a certain degree. Maybe. 

Breathing in deeply and smiling to herself for the first time in what felt like weeks, she rolled down the windows, and made her way home.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haha remember me ? i am so sorry for not updating sooner, like i said this whole thing is me just trying to get better at writing but i didn't know how to progress the story... but now i do! so. that being said. i hope you enjoy this chapter. it ain't the best but i didn't know what else to write since i haven't fully gotten into the swing of things yet. the chapter title was something i pulled out of my ass.
> 
> all feedback is welcome and in fact encouraged :)

It took her less time than she expected. Earlier that day she had pulled up into the driveway of a normal, two-story, single family home, and spent a grand total of four minutes searching through her purse for the garage keys, only to remember that she had placed them in the glove compartment months prior. Glancing at the house, you would’ve thought that it was home to The All-American Family, complete with 2.5 kids and a dog, all promptly displayed on the back window of an SUV. And it might’ve been at one point, but now it was missing the picket fence, the dog, the people and the SUV. Now, it was simply the empty shell of the life Sharon once had. 

She spent most of her morning mindlessly unpacking her boxes and cleaning the dust off her furniture, floating from room to room. She kept trying to figure out what to do with herself. Giving up, she began scavenging the kitchen for something worth eating. The fridge was empty. So were most of her cabinets. Growing slightly annoyed, she turned to her pantry and found that it wasn’t bare. Inside it there were some stale crackers, a few boxes of macaroni and cheese, and a jar of expired peanut butter that could be substituted for cement. Immediately shutting the door, she stood there with her hand still on the handle and closed her eyes. Huffing out a laugh, she then opened her eyes and stared at her floor. “Oh my god,” she whispered to herself, “I’ve become a fucking toddler.” 

It didn’t take her long to cook the pasta, the motions of it familiar and soothing to her. It wasn’t like her mom’s homemade recipe, but it was enough for the time being.

Deciding she’d rather forgo sitting in silence, she took her bowl to the living room, where she sat on top of the couch and crossed her legs, reaching for the remote. She sat there switching between all the channels, not even bothering to see what the news channel had to say. She probably knew more about the issue than they did. Sharon eventually settled on some sitcom rerun she remembered watching while undercover in Europe a few years ago. Like the previous time, she paid very little attention to the actual plot and instead decided to let the laugh tracks wash over her like shallow waves. 

Watching and eating in silence, she allowed herself to be consumed by her thousand yard stare. One might’ve even mistaken her expression for serene, though this could not be further from the truth. Her mind, not quite having caught on with the change of pace, was still reeling from the havoc of the past week. She sat there dwelling over the exact moment her life had gone to shit. Had it really all begun with those gunshots? The ones that rang through the apartment complex so jarringly, that made her stomach drop in a way she hadn’t thought possible? She knew now that they had just served as a catalyst, but she couldn’t help but think about how deep Hydra had been buried. Looking at it now, it terrified her just how effectively they were hidden. _Hydra’s been there from the get-go,_ she reminded herself, _they spent 70 years learning how to hide in plain sight. There’s nothing you could’ve done about that._ This had become the mantra she had used to try to ease her guilty conscience. It had yet to work.

Before she could allow herself to become fully consumed by hindsight, there came a knock on her door; the echo making the house sound like a cavern. Sharon flinched violently, her head turning to face the door so suddenly she could almost feel the ache she would have tomorrow. That was an issue to be faced another time. Right now, her heartbeat was quickening, and she mentally did a quick rundown of where everything was and what precautions she had taken upon her arrival. Had she locked her door? She was almost certain she had. This didn’t do much to soothe her. Wanting to avoid making a mess, she slowly but silently lowered her bowl to the floor. Shifting her weight ever so slightly, she reached over towards the coffee table and un-holstered the gun hidden beneath it. Standing with caution, she slowly stalked towards the door, but held in front of her but facing the ground. She wasn’t wearing shoes, she realized, but in the worst case scenario she would be able to hold her ground until backup arrived. It was likely just another one of her neighbors trying to talk to her. Jury’s was still out as to whether or not that was the more preferable scenario.

She looked through the peephole of her front door, not knowing what to expect, but gearing up for the worst. Nothing could have prepared her for who she saw. 

Relaxing her stance by a bit, she swung her door wide open and looked up expectantly at the man who had supposedly been rewired to become the closest thing a person could get to perfection. Instead, she was faced with a looming figure who looked at her with eyebags so profound they seemed to dampen the intensity of his eyes. 

“I need your help,” said Steve Fucking Rogers, who was standing on her doorstep, here, in her house in the middle of suburban Maryland, looking like pure shit. 

Realizing she was nearly gaping at him, she attempted to stand up a bit straighter. She scanned the surroundings for a few moments, and once satisfied, she looked back at him. It was only then that she realized that he was holding a duffle bag and a thick folder. Opening the door for him, she nudged her head towards the living room. “You should probably come inside.” Steve visibly relaxed ever so slightly, and wiped his shoes on the welcome mat before letting Sharon close the door and lead him into the house.

**Author's Note:**

> lemme know what y'all think :)


End file.
